


Dimly

by Milieu



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Mind Control, Other, Psychological Horror, Undead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2018-12-10
Packaged: 2019-09-15 22:18:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16941738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milieu/pseuds/Milieu
Summary: Liam died, but that wasn't the end of it. Death rarely is, where Sylvanas is concerned.





	Dimly

Liam Greymane lived and breathed for his people and the ancestral lands of Gilneas. No one who knew of him would have questioned that. He'd have done even more for the Alliance had he had the chance, but he settled (if one could even call it settling) for being the champion of the Gilnean people.

Liam Greymane was beloved. He was the shining light of Gilneas's future, the adored heir of the Greymane name. That his light should be extinguished so soon, when it had just begun to truly burn, was a bitter cruelty.

But oh, how he shone when he had the chance. He gave everything he had for Gilneas, for his people and family, and when he died, Liam Greymane died a hero.

The Banshee Queen's arrow snuffed out that light and made a martyr of Liam, and that was the end of his life, but not his legacy. The idea and memory of Liam lived on in the hearts of his people.

Liam himself lived on elsewhere.

\---

Ravenous.

The hunger was the first thing he knew when he woke, and he never stopped knowing it. He thought perhaps that he had been bitten, back before-

Before. There was only Before and Now.

Perhaps he had been bitten Before, and it combined with the so-called gifts that he had Now, and that was why he always hungered.

Sometimes, he was allowed to indulge the bloodlust. The Banshee Queen's voice in his mind would recede, and the red mist would descend, and he would sate himself. For a short time.

More often, he was guided by her voice, a prisoner in his own slowly decaying body, and the hunger was only a dull ache.

That was the kindest thing to say about all his pains. They were dulled, sometimes barely there, but they  _were_ there. Always. Hunger pangs and the terrible ache in his chest.

It amused her. She would sit wherever the Forsaken made their headquarters, queen of rot upon a makeshift throne, and he would be her amusement when there was nothing else. She liked to ask questions and then answer herself back through the use of his tongue, like he was a ventriloquist dummy sat on a performer's knee.

"Are you satisfied with your work for the Horde, Prince Greymane?"

"Yes, my lady," he answered, mouth working with no input of his own.

"Do you want for anything, serving under me?"

"No, my lady."

"What of your family? What will you say, when you see them again?"

"I will say nothing, but to pledge my allegiance to the Horde and the Forsaken, my lady."

"And will there be any hesitation in your heart?"

"No, my lady."

And she would smile, directing his face up towards her from where he knelt.

"If that's true, Prince Greymane, then why do I feel your mind shudder so?"

And Liam could only struggle in thought, trapped in his own body.

\---

They muttered about him when he passed, flanking the Banshee Queen on one side and Blightcaller on the other. Leader of the Forsaken and her two champions.

In the beginning, they called him by name, with derision. It changed, little by little, as they watched him in battle.

How many Worgen fell to his blade? How many to his bare hands, wet with gore, tissue beneath his fingernails and then between his teeth? How many turned from hatred to horror when they recognized the face of their killer?

The Berserker Prince. The Devouring Prince. Greymane the Ghastly. Greymane the Slaughterer. The Pack Render. The Wolf-Killer.

Slowly, slowly, like someone bleeding out alone in the night, Liam slipped away.

Always by Sylvanas's side. Always with her voice in his ears. If he closed his eyes in the midst of battle, he saw her smile.

Always alternating between the red mist and the endless gray gloom of her hold on him. Madness and despair. A lantern flickering and going out, leaving him stranded in the woods as dark, ravenous things closed in on all sides.

He closed his eyes in the heat of battle and opened them to find himself at her side again, a mantle of pelts around his shoulders, his hands always stained red. The last stubborn bit of wick on a melted-down candle, still barely lit.

It was finally snuffed out completely not by his Queen, but his King.

Opposite sides. Lines of battle drawn. The air moist and hot with spilled blood, the silence in the pause between battles.

Genn's eyes were far away and empty, and Liam (he was still Liam, he would always be Liam, but who was Liam now?) couldn't tell if Genn looked through him and saw nothing left, or if there was nothing left within Genn himself.

"I have no son. No longer. He died at your hand, Windrunner, and you'll not sway me with this obscene mockery."

And so the last champion of Gilneas died a second time, and Liam Greymane, champion of the Banshee Queen, drew his weapon, and the scream on his lips as the bloodshed began anew was  __for the Horde.

**Author's Note:**

> There's a story hook here, but heck if I can focus long enough to write it.


End file.
